


Push and Pull

by Ansta



Category: Divergent Series - Veronica Roth
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-21
Updated: 2017-09-21
Packaged: 2019-01-03 18:39:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12152484
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ansta/pseuds/Ansta
Summary: Tris is small town girl in a big orphanage in Chicago. She feels broken but can a blue-eyed boy and a new family bring truth to her hopes of healing? Or will life prove to her that true love and friendship are only meant for princesses, no matter what fiction might say?





	Push and Pull

Love that lasts

CHAPTER 1

"Not again," I groaned as the school bully walked towards me. His name was Eric; he had been pushing me around since I was little. Over a dozen piercings littered his face, making his smile eerily resemble that of the stuff from nightmares.

"Beatrice," he said with little emotion, glaring at me and waiting for my lunch. I meekly handed over my lunch box to him that he sniffed thoroughly, a rather disgusting sight, before opening. I hoped my mom had cooked something disgusting, as I did every time I handed my lunch over to the person who tormented my school days. I knew I should stand up to him but Abnegation did not do that. We helped people. We gave until there was nothing left to give and then somehow we gave them some more. Even at the age of ten, I knew that, it made me feel so guilty, and out of place every time I failed to uphold the ideal my community, my faction lived by. And so, I tried. Handing over my lunch to bullies despite knowing there were others who needed it more. Being meek and remaining hidden, even as every cell n my body cried to take a stand. Biting my tongue during family functions as I grew older but now am getting ahead of the story.

My full name is Beatrice Prior and this event took place every year since I went to Abnegation School, the only school in my small town. I was ten and the favourite target of the fifteen-year-old school bully. In all my ten-year-old innocence I used to belief that I must have done something wrong to be punished this way by him, until I realized better. Maybe he knew I was not a proper Abnegation member, hat I was useless and wrong. I know you are wondering what the point to this sob story is but it will all clear up as this story progresses.

Eric had put a piece of homemade cake in his mouth that he immediately spat out. Even if I had tried, which I admit I never did, I could not have helped the grin that spread across my face as he attempted to wash his mouth out with some unfortunate girl's milk. I did know how that would end. Eric had a mean right hook. Abnegation never complained, it was too selfish, and no one cared if an Erudite boy hit a stiff. They would automatically assume I was wrong. To the Abnegation, I would have been t selfish. To the others, it would haven trying to act above my section. What did a stiff and a sneak know of propriety? Eric was my superior in every way as far as the town was concerned and well, lunch as just a small thing to give. It wasn't like he was asking for my life, never mind that food was necessary to live.

That day, as I stood against the lockers of the older students, people rushed by us, no one even sparing me a glance. Grey colored clocks hid the guilt or angry faces of my faction members as they walked by, not even trying to help me and Erudite hid behind glasses and when some tried to walk towards us, others held them back. The Amity were too peaceful o be seen anywhere near bullies like Eric and the Candor hid behind their ideas of justice. They were supposed to honest but in reality all they were was law abiding. And law dictated that the Abnegation gave. Law dictated that the Erudite were above the grey clothed "stiffs". Law said I was wrong, simply because of where I was born. Looking back, I despise those laws. The only ones who might have lifted a finger to help and been allowed by the law to d so were the Dauntless. Covered in black from head to toe, they were like something out of a book in my small world. Their arms were works of arts as clan symbols would spiral up and down them in majestic tattoos. Most went for black but some had so many details on their bodies, I had to often avert my eyes, lest I be rebuked for staring. Abnegation did not look anyone in the eye. That day, the day when this tale is set, there wasn't a single Dauntless in the building. Their faction had one of their festive, something to do with running far as I knew, and so I was left at the mercy of Eric and his creepy smile.

Just as Eric was about to hit me, Caleb, my older brother, came up. How do I describe Caleb? He was my only friend and would protect me with his life. He was also the poster child of Abnegation and next in line to be the faction head, a responsibility and privilege that allowed him more books, more authority and more freedom than anyone else did. He was the only one who could have said something to Eric and gotten away with it. Of course, he would have to frame it as an act of selflessness but if anything; my brother was one hell of an actor. He had done it before and could do it again. Eric saw him standing there and fled to the nearest bathroom, afraid that Caleb would mention the incident in the next meeting of the faction heads. Even at fifteen, being the next in line to be a leader was a big deal in our town. I ran and hid my face in his shirt, hugging him. The next week, Eric left school.

A year passed that incident and my brother left our faction to work in the town. He now had the house of a council member where all the faction leaders lived with their spouses and children. No other had ever been allowed there. It was more than a day's walk from the Abnegation sector and of course, the Abnegation were rarely given the privilege of using vehicles. If anyone else could have the seat, they were offered. Anything else was too selfish. I couldn't bear to stay away from Caleb, selfish as it was, and when my physical state caught up to my emotional state I fell ill. He came back home a few days later and promised never to leave me again, something the both f us knew to be a lie, but life in school was still a personal hell for me. I waited for my graduation year like a kid waiting for a Christmas present and after a year of endless humiliation and pain it finally came. I was twelve. Had I been an Erudite or the next in line to be a faction leader, I would have been allowed to peruse higher studies. Other factions took vocational training. Caleb, Mom and Dad came to the local school to see me "graduate" and afterwards I started working in our family bakery. All was good for a while, but then my happiness was shattered when a car accident took our mom and dad away. They had gone to visit Caleb and got hit near the Erudite sector on their way back. The driver was never found. At twelve years and four months of age, I was an orphan.

Caleb became my only family that cared. We worked hard to make the ends meet and I even moved to a smaller house. Not that I particularly cared. I lived alone, what would I do with a house full of memories and empty rooms? Others with larger families were welcome to it as far as I was concerned. No, what I hated about my new place of residence was how close it was to the Erudite sector. Every single day, I would have to gze on the spot where my parents' bodies had been found. Every day was a struggle to survive and when the war broke out, Caleb was forced to fight. As my every other male. Of course, we females were considered "too delicate". I would have shown them delicate had I been given a chance. The only females even allowed near the battle fields were the Dauntless females, with their high bows and braided hair and delicate but deadly daggers. Even in an era of guns and tablets, our town was known better for its archers and stealth walkers.

I know you must be wondering why am I speaking of the war that everyone knows about. Why am I talking about the faction system that was abolished but five years ago? The system people fought so hard against but be patient please. I cannot walk into a new life, without revealing who I am and how I came to be me.

All I could do was waiting for the war to end, and hope he made it through. Many a times I was tempted to dress up as a Dauntless and leave to see what was happening but helping the old and dying, comforting the widows and building pyres for soldiers who never came home took over my life. Every single day I waited, I slowly lost all taste for happiness. All I wanted was my brother back, laughing and smiling, brown locks of hair falling into his green eyes that would be twinkling with mischief.

One day after what felt like a millennia a letter arrived from the government stating bluntly that Caleb, my only brother, had died on the battlefield. At thirteen, I had no family left.

My whole world came crashing down after that.

Two months later, the faction system was abolished and the war ended.

I didn't know what to do and am now living in an orphanage waiting for death, where I will meet my family again. I do not even know why I struggle to live when all I want is death. I know he would have wanted me to be happy but now I know it is impossible.

Yet, I am alive and I know that I have to live. In four years time, I will be twenty-two and an adult in our society. I have had years to grieve but still I wake up screaming. This was life. Difficult and filled with pain. Even my torments left me, let alone family and I was never allowed to have friends. Despite the end to the faction system, my town is still steeped in the old ways. No one speaks to me and before you throw this letter away, let me assure you, I do not write this seeking sympathy or pity. At my worst, I would ask for understanding. Thing is, I write this hoping that somewhere out of this town, somewhere in this world that I have not seen and yearn to witness, there is a place where people are more than the color of their clothing, that they are treated as human beings. Someplace where we are more than our genders. Somewhere where books, art and music still thrive, somewhere where both solitude and friendship are present. I have sought solace in words and music but that has not taken away my scars or tears. All it has done is taught me to live with them and be at peace with who I am, something that is an everyday struggle. I do not write to say that I want or even need any of the above because that would be asking to much of someone who knows nothing of me and someone who wants to help. I cannot ask you to change an entire society but I request of you, please take me in only if you can treat me like a person. A person who has the right to participate in making the decisions of her own life, who has the right to be herself. I am not saying I won't change my flaw and nor do I mean to be rude, but I am asking that you make me a member of your family accepting that I am broken, that at best I am a mosaic and that while I may heal, I cannot leave my past completely. I cannot forget that I had a family before. I am sorry if I am not what you are looking for, that I am no ray of sunshine but I cannot pretend. Not anymore. I refuse to. Sorry.

_  
I put the letter in the envelope,  
the letter that was my life,  
the letter that had almost all my secrets,  
the letter that would decide what would happen to me,  
and hand it over to the orphanage owner- Miss Tori.

She had asked me to write a letter to my pen pal, I don't even know who he or she is. All I know is that that person is a friend of the foster family that might take me in. I know I should have written a better letter to make a better impression but I do not want to lie, I am broken and if they want to have me, they will have to accept me as I am. I get up as I wipe my tears and stare into space dreaming of my lost family and all the things that could have been.


End file.
